[Posted
05/24/04]:"Federal
Officials Ok Texas Cow Material For Swine Feed:" (05/04/04): "The
byproducts of a Texas cow that was destroyed after it showed
potential signs of a central nervous disorder must be made
into pig feed or be destroyed, the Food and Drug Administration
said Tuesday. The FDA said it tracked down all the material
from the cow that was sent to a processor for rendering into
animal feed and other products. All the material is being held
by a business that the agency did not name. The government
has said that none of it got into the human food supply.

The FDA planned to send a letter to the business saying it "will not object
to use of this material in swine feed only" because pigs are not considered
susceptible to mad cow disease, one in a family of illnesses known to infect
grass-eating animals. If the business agrees to only using the material in swine
feed, FDA said it will then track the material through the supply chain from
the processor to the farm to ensure that the feed is monitored and fed only to
pigs."
[Edited from:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20040504-1452-cowdeath.html

[See also: "The Case of Mad Pigs in the U.S." at:
http://www.cyber-dyne.com/~tom/mad_pigs.html[Posted 12/28/03]: 12/27/03: "FDA
Blasted Over Past Enforcement Of Feed Ban: Long before
mad cow disease appeared in Washington, the federal government
slammed the Food and Drug Administration for failing to adequately
enforce feed regulations, a key piece of the nation's firewall
against the disease. On Wednesday, the FDA tried to reassure the
public by saying it has "vigorously enforced" a 1997
law that bans the use of meat and bone meal from dead ruminants
(cows, sheep and goats) in feed for live ruminants. The agency
said more than 99 percent of feed operators are now complying with
the law. But in January 2002, the General Accounting Office --
Congress' investigative arm -- criticized the FDA for failing to
adequately enforce the feed ban. It said the agency had failed
to issue warning letters to violators and inspection records were
incomplete, inconsistent, inaccurate and untimely. The FDA's records,
investigators said, were "so severely flawed" that they
shouldn't be used to assess compliance. "FDA has not placed
a priority on oversight of the feed ban," the report said." [Edited from:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/154248_feed27.html

[Posted
12/28/03]: "Meat
Groups Protest Proposed FDA Restrictions On Animal Feed:" (02/06/2003): "A
coalition of agricultural organizations led by the American
Meat Institute (AMI) is arguing
that no scientific reason exists for FDA's recent proposed changes
to animal feed regulations. In comments filed with FDA recently,
the groups said safeguards are already in place to protect the
US livestock industry from the threat of bovine spongiform encephalopathy
(BSE or mad cow disease). AMI has specifically expressed concern
over FDA's suggestion that brains and spinal cords from ruminants
two years of age and older be excluded from all rendered products.
In its comments, AMI said brains and spinal cords produced in
the US pose no BSE risk, and any regulations beyond those are
already
in place would be redundant to existing animal feed regulations
and could send the wrong message to other countries. AMI is a
national association that represents meat and poultry slaughterers
and processors.
Its members slaughter more than 90% of the cattle raised in the
US and process most of the rendered products produced in the
US. If FDA excludes brains and spinal cords from rendered products,
it might send an erroneous message that additional control measures
are needed because the US is uncertain of its BSE status, AMI
said.
Their preference would be for achieving better compliance with
existing regulations. AMI says no evidence exists that brains,
spinal cords or other bovine tissues that are derived from US
cattle slaughter operations contain the infective agent that
causes BSE.
The group also noted that brains and spinal cords are inspected
and passed for human consumption by USDA's Food Safety and Inspection
Service. The American Farm Bureau Federation, American Meat Institute,
National Cattlemen's Beef Association, National Pork Producers
Council
were among the 15 groups that signed the letter."[From:
http://www.agriculture.com/default.sph/AgNews.class?FNC=sideBarMore__ANewsindex_html___49333

[Posted
05/24/04]:"Japan
Demands Us Tests All Slaughtered Cows:" (04/26/04): "Japanese
Agriculture Minister Yoshiyuki Kamei said last week that
Japan was sticking to its demand that the United States
check all slaughtered cattle for mad cow disease as a
prelude to resuming imports of U.S. beef. "It is
important not to harm the confidence of consumers," Kamei
told reporters after a Cabinet meeting. So far, Washington
has refused Tokyo's demand that all cattle be tested,
saying there is no scientific justification for such
a costly measure. Japan is normally the top buyer of
U.S. beef and the four-month ban has halted purchases
that last year amounted to nearly $1.4 billion.

The USDA reiterated this week that it would stand by its decision to prohibit
Kansas-based meat packer Creekstone Farms Premium Beef from independently testing
for mad cow disease so it could resume sales to Japan."
[Edited from:
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/24876/story.htm

[Posted
05/24/04]:"U.S.
Creates Expert Panel To Discuss Testing Methods" (04/26/04): "A
former senator is pressing Agriculture Secretary Ann
Veneman to reconsider her department's refusal to let
U.S. beef producers do their own testing for mad cow
disease. Nancy Kassebaum Baker, the wife of U.S. ambassador
to Japan Howard Baker, said such testing could promote
confidence in U.S. beef and help re-establish exports
to countries that ban it now. Baker put her viewpoint
in a letter to Veneman earlier this month. The Kansas
Republican said she was stating her opinion as a private
beef producer.

A series of visiting U.S. delegations have failed to persuade Japan's government
to lift a ban imposed on American beef imports after a single case of mad cow
disease was detected in Washington state in late December. But the two countries
agreed to try to narrow their differences by establishing a working group of
experts. A Japanese foreign ministry official said the experts will try to
establish "common ground" on technical issues. The panel will report
by the end of the summer in hopes of resuming trade."
[Edited from:
http://www.wftv.com/health/3220588/detail.html

[Posted
05/24/04]:"USDA
Investigating Condemned Texas Cow:" (05/01/04): "The
U.S. Department of Agriculture did not test a head of cattle
in Texas that displayed central nervous symptoms even though
such symptoms could be associated with mad cow disease, USDA
officials said on Friday. The department is collecting information
on the Texas animal, USDA spokeswoman Alisa Harrison said
on Friday, emphasizing there is no evidence yet that the
animal may have had mad cow disease.

" We do know that the animal was condemned and it didn't go into the meat
supply," Harrison said. Harrison added that early indications were that
there "were not any samples taken" from the animal. Asked whether any
tissue samples, such as from the animal's brain, were still available for testing,
Harrison said, "I do not know." Harrison said federal inspectors in
Texas were being interviewed about the condemned animal. "We have to go
back and figure out exactly what happened and what the real situation is or isn't," she
said.

Beverly Boyd, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Agriculture,
said the condemned carcass in San Angelo was not held back
for testing. "There were no tissue
samples taken. It was not tested at all," she told Reuters. Caroline Smith
DeWaal, food safety director for the Center for Science in the Public Interest,
questioned why USDA may have failed to test the condemned animal. "If they're
not testing the cattle most highly recommended for testing, it would appear USDA
is not really looking to find the problem where it may exist," DeWaal said."
[Very edited from:
http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=healthNews&storyID=5005946&section=news

[Posted
05/24/04]:"USDA:
Mad Cow Testing Procedure Violated In Texas:" (05/03/04): "The
federal government's mad cow testing procedure was violated
when a condemned cow in Texas was sent to a rendering plant
before tissue samples could be collected for testing, the U.S.
Department of Agriculture said on Monday. A USDA veterinarian
at a Lone Star Beef plant in San Angelo, Texas condemned the
animal "after observing the cow stagger and fall, indicating
either an injury or potentially a central nervous system disorder
or other health condition," USDA said.

USDA said no part of the animal, killed on April 27, entered
the human food chain. "Standard
procedures call for animals condemned due to possible CNS (central nervous system)
disorder to be kept" until federal officials collect samples for testing,
the USDA said. "However, this did not occur in this case," according
to a USDA statement. The statement did not explain why standard procedures were
not followed and USDA officials were not immediately available for comment."
[Edited from:
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=domesticNews&storyID=5019214&section=news

[Posted
05/24/04]:"Texas
Mad Cow Breach Not Unique:" (05/05/04): "The
recent case of a Texas cow that displayed symptoms consistent
with mad cow disease but slipped through the cracks of the
U.S. Department of Agriculture's surveillance plan is not
an isolated incident, an agency veterinarian and a consumer
advocate told United Press International. The revelation
that the cow was not tested has generated alarm among the
public and Congress, and a USDA veterinarian said cows displaying
central nervous system disorders, such as the one in Texas,
often are not tested for mad cow -- even though the department
considers these animals the most likely to be infected with
the disease.

"Sometimes Veterinary Services (the USDA branch responsible for picking
up brains for mad cow testing) won't even show up," the veterinarian, who
requested anonymity, told UPI. "If you tell them the cow is under 30 months
(old), they won't bother with it." The USDA recently announced an expanded
mad cow surveillance plan aimed at testing an unspecified number of cows over
30 months old. The agency's position is cows under 30 months are unlikely to
test positive, even if infected, because the disease can take several years to
incubate. Yet, more than 20 cows under this age have tested positive worldwide,
including one as young as 20 months in the United Kingdom.

Felicia Nestor, senior policy adviser to the Government Accountability
Project in Washington, a group that works with federal whistleblowers,
told UPI she is
looking into claims from USDA inspectors there may be other suspicious animals
that have gone unreported. "From the evidence we have so far, we know (the
Texas case) is not an isolated incident," Nestor said."
[Very edited from long and disturbing article at:
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0505-04.htm

[Posted
05/24/04]:"USDA's
Vets & Techs Ordered Not To Test Suspect Cow:" (05/05/04): "It
was a trio of Agriculture Department staff - two veterinarians
and one technician - who were supposed to follow agency protocol
by testing what they determined was an older cow that likely
had a central nervous system disorder when it arrived April
27 at the Lone Star Beef plant in San Angelo, Texas. One government
source and another within the industry, both of whom say they
have firsthand knowledge of events that day, said the final
call on not to test the animal was made by an APHIS supervisor
in Austin, Texas, after an APHIS technician at the plant advised
her supervisor she was preparing to take a tissue sample from
the culled animal for BSE testing. Both sources spoke to Meatingplace.com
on condition of anonymity, and USDA officials did not return
telephone calls Tuesday seeking comment and confirmation of
the allegations.

What USDA has confirmed is that the agency's standard operating
procedures call for animals condemned due to a possible CNS
disorder be kept until APHIS officials
can collect samples for testing. That clearly was done in this case. The animal
sat for more than 90 minutes and less than two hours after it was condemned,
stunned and killed before the APHIS tech told Lone Star Beef management to dispose
of the animal "in a routine manner." As a condemned cow, there was
never any chance that the meat from the animal would enter the food chain. What
is less clear is what went wrong at USDA and why."
[Edited from:
http://www.meatingplace.com/DailyNews/pop.asp?ID=12310

[Posted
05/23/04]"USDA
Immediately Stopped Mad Cow Tests At Slaughterhouse Where
Disease Was Found:" (02/24/04): "The federal
government fell short of its goal for mad-cow tests last
year in the Northwest, where the nation's first case of the
brain-wasting disease was found just before Christmas. The
U.S. Department of Agriculture's surveillance plan said it
would take at least 1,205 tests to adequately monitor the
five-state area, which includes Washington, Oregon, Idaho,
Montana and Utah. But the agency collected only 781 samples,
less than two-thirds of the target. ... At Vern's Moses Lake
Meats, the slaughterhouse where the infected cow was killed,
no animals have been tested since Dec. 24, co-owner Tom Ellestad
said. "USDA requested us to stop taking samples," he
said. Ellestad didn't know why USDA made the request." [Very
edited from:
http://www.unknownnews.net/040225madcowb.html

[Posted
05/23/04]"USDA
Estimates Mad Cow Test Costs:" (04/07/04): "The
U.S. government's plans to make beef safe from mad cow
disease could cost the industry up to $150 million a
year, the Agriculture Department said Wednesday and indicated
it was open to amending the proposed rules. After finding
the first and only U.S. case of mad cow disease in December,
the USDA issued a series of interim rules to further
protect food from the brain-wasting disease. Among the
rules imposed in January to prevent the spread of bovine
spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE, was a ban on the use
of so-called downer cattle in food. These are animals
either too sick or too injured to walk. The USDA also
issued stricter measures to ensure tissue from the nervous
system, like the spinal cord, do not contaminate meat
produced by hydraulic pressure equipment, also known
as advanced meat recovery systems. In a report published
on Wednesday, the USDA estimated these two regulations
would cost the industry up to $150 million annually. "Price
impacts are expected to be limited to beef by-products
and variety meats which constitute a small share of domestic
beef consumption," USDA said. The USDA estimated
about 213 million pounds of beef will be affected by
the rules annually. Total U.S. beef output this year
was pegged at 25.28 billion pounds."
[Edited from the article also containing countries' testing statistics at:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4687099/

[Posted
05/23/04]"USDA
Rejects Independent Mad Cow Testing:" (04/09/04): "The
U.S. Agriculture Department will not allow American beef
companies to independently test their cattle for mad cow
disease to appease Japanese concerns, an agency official
said on Friday. The USDA rejected a request by Creekstone
Farms Premium Beef to allow 100 percent testing for the brain-wasting
disease, a step the privately owned company deemed necessary
to resume trade with Japan.

"The use of the test as proposed by Creekstone would have implied a consumer
safety aspect that is not scientifically warranted," said USDA Undersecretary
Bill Hawks in a statement. The USDA has repeatedly said Japan's demand for 100
percent testing was not scientifically justified. U.S. Vice President Richard
Cheney was expected to raise the issue when he visits Japan next week.

Creekstone, which sells 20 percent of its beef to Japan, said it was considering
taking legal action against USDA and would make a decision early next week. "We
firmly disagree with USDA," said John Stewart, Creekstone's chief executive.
The company had already spent hundreds of thousands of dollars building a private
laboratory at its Arkansas City, Kansas, beef plant in anticipation of winning
government approval. Japan's three-month ban costs Creekstone up to $100,000
daily in lost sales, the company said. About 50 workers have been laid off."
[Edited from:
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=healthNews&storyID=4795187

[Posted
05/23/04]"U.S.
Won't Let Company Test All Its Cattle For Mad Cow:" (04/10/04): "The
Department of Agriculture refused yesterday to allow
a Kansas beef producer to test all of its cattle for
mad cow disease, saying such sweeping tests were not
scientifically warranted. Lobbying groups for cattle
ranchers and slaughterhouses applauded the decision,
but consumer advocates denounced it, saying the department
was preventing Creekstone from taking extra steps to
prove its product was safe. Under the Virus Serum Toxin
Act of 1913, the department decides where cattle can
be tested and for what.

Consumer groups accused the department of bending to the will of the beef lobby,
saying producers do not want the expense of proving that all cattle are safe
or the damage to meat sales that would result if more cases of mad cow are found. "It
is ironic in the extreme that an administration that's so interested in letting
industry come up with its own solutions would come down with a heavy government
hand on a company that's being creative," said Dr. Peter Lurie, deputy director
of the health research group at Public Citizen, a frequent food industry critic.

The president of the American Meat Institute, which represents slaughterhouses,
and the director of regulatory affairs at the National Cattlemen's Beef Association,
which represents ranchers, praised the decision. Gary Weber of the cattlemen's
association called 100 percent testing misleading to consumers because it would
create a false impression that untested beef was not safe. He compared it to
demanding that all cars be crash tested to prove they are safe. Asked if beef
producers did not want to be pressured to imitate Creekstone and pay for more
tests, Mr. Weber said it was "absolutely not about the money."
[Very edited from:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/10/national/nationalspecial2/10COW.html

[Posted
05/23/04]"Beef
Packer To Fight USDA On BSE Testing": (4/12/04): "Creekstone
Farms Premium Beef LLC said it will "aggressively
challenge USDA's decision" late last week not to
allow Creekstone to voluntarily test all the cattle it
processes for bovine spongiform encephalopathy. The company
said that since it asked USDA Feb. 19 for permission
to privately test beef at the company's Arkansas City,
Kans., plant, company officials have held "ongoing
meetings" with USDA officials but the USDA announcement "came
as a surprise to the company."

"We are extremely disappointed but nonetheless relieved to finally have
a response from the USDA," said John Stewart, Creekstone chief executive
officer, in a company news release. "We now know where USDA stands but are
surprised it took them six weeks to respond with a 'no' to our request." Stewart
said his company hasn't ruled out legal action as it considers options to challenge
USDA's authority. "We have a back-up strategy in place and over the weekend
we will be finalizing our plans, which we will unveil early next week," Stewart
said in the release.

Creekstone said it has built "one of the best laboratories in the country
inside of our processing plant to perform BSE testing," said Steward. "We
have the equipment in place and staff trained to perform these tests. The company
plans to use a test made by BioRad, a company based in Hercules, Calif., to test
the animals; that's the same test the French and Japanes use to test all their
animals, said the company."
[Edited from:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/madcow/fight041404.cfm

[Posted
05/23/04]:"Records
Contradict USDA's Mad Cow Decision:" (04/21/04): "A
recent U.S. Department of Agriculture decision to block
a private company from testing all its cattle under 30
months of age for mad cow disease runs contrary to its
own records that show it has tested more than 2,000 animals
in that age range, United Press International has learned.
In announcing the decision to reject Creekstone's proposal,
Bill Hawks, USDA's undersecretary for marketing and regulatory
programs, said, "There is no scientific justification
for 100 percent testing because the disease does not
appear in younger animals" under the age of 30 months.

The department's mad cow testing records, however, which were obtained by UPI
via the Freedom of Information Act, show over the past two years the agency tested
2,051 animals -- and possibly more -- that were under the age of 30 months. "That's
so hypocritical," said Michael Hansen, senior research associate with Consumers
Union, the advocacy group in Yonkers, N.Y. "It makes it difficult for the
USDA to argue to Creekstone, 'We only test animals above 30 months,' when USDA
itself tests animals as young as 3 months old."

Consumers Union, along with 12 other advocacy groups -- including Public Citizen
and the Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease Foundation -- sent USDA a letter Monday urging
it to reverse its position on the Creekstone proposal, as well as to expand its
surveillance program to include animals under 30 months old. Hansen said he would
like to see the testing program amended to include animals as young as 20 months
because infected animals of that age have been detected in Japan and two animals
under the age of 30 months have tested positive for mad cow in Europe."
[Very edited from the long article at:
http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20040420-052613-8197r[Posted
04/29/04]:"Bill:
Mad Cow Tests For All State's Cattle: (03/28/04): "A
week after federal officials announced plans to increase
testing for mad cow disease, two California legislators
introduced a bill to require all cattle in the state
to be tested for the disease. If passed, SB 1425 could
pit California against the U.S. Department of Agriculture,
which is considering whether to allow anyone other
than its scientists to test for mad cow, also known
as bovine spongiform encephalopathy or BSE.

The California Cattlemen's Association on Thursday
denounced the bill as overreacting to the Washington
case. "There is absolutely no scientific basis for testing
each and every animal in this state," said association president Darrel
Sweet. "Any California-specific testing program for BSE is unnecessary,
impractical, would place California's ranchers at a serious competitive disadvantage
to less-regulated regions, and may be in violation of federal law." The
USDA has maintained that it is the only agency that can legally purchase or authorize
the sale and administration of mad cow test kits."
[Very edited from:
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/8297336.htm

[Posted
04/29/04]:"USDA's
Top Official On Mad Cow Testing Resigns: (03/23/04): "The
U.S. official responsible for the nation's mad cow testing
program is resigning, the Agriculture Department confirmed
Tuesday. Bobby Acord, administrator of the USDA's Animal
and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS), is stepping
down for personal reasons, spokeswoman Courtney Billet told
MSNBC. "He has decided to retire," Billet said. "He
has been taking care of his mom and he also has been responsible
for an elderly aunt in West Virginia."

Acord has been a vocal critic of expanded testing for bovine
spongiform encephalopathy ... in early March, several House
members were frustrated by Acord's responses
to their questions during panel testimony about testing for mad cow disease. "It's
really like pulling teeth or worse trying to get the right kind of information
out of these people," Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-N.Y., told MSNBC on Tuesday.
Of Acord's retirement, Hinchey said, "It's not shocking, but you wonder
why he would select this particular moment.""
[Very edited from:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/madcow/resign032604.cfm

[Posted
04/29/04]:"USDA
Certifies Bio-rad Test For Mad Cow Disease: (03/18/04): "The
U.S. Agriculture Department on Thursday approved the first
rapid tests for detecting mad cow disease in cattle, allowing
officials to determine within hours if a cow is infected.
Bio-Rad Inc. said its tests will be used by about 25 state
and federal laboratories that are working to determine whether
the animal brain-wasting disease has taken hold in the U.S.
cattle population.

The USDA on Monday announced a one-year program to test
as many "high risk" cattle
as possible for mad cow disease, boosting its surveillance after finding the
first and only U.S. case in December. Under the federal program, the USDA said
testing 268,000 cattle per year would allow inspectors to be 99 percent confident
that if there was one case of mad cow disease among 10 million cattle, it could
be identified."
[Edited from:
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=healthNews&storyID=4601244

[Posted
04/28/04]:"Obstructing
Mad Cow Testing By Beef Producers In The U.S.: (03/09/04): "The
USDA, which conducts only limited testing on its own,
doesn't allow private testing for the fatal brain-wasting
disease in cattle, in part because officials worry
that potential marketing for tested meat would confuse
consumers. Federal officials also say they fear that
private laboratories would report false positives,
upsetting overseas customers and causing cattle prices
to crash. By keeping mad-cow testing within USDA walls,
officials argue, the government can confirm test results
before they become public.

Creekstone Farms Premium Beef LLC, a meatpacker that slaughters cattle at a plant
in Arkansas City, Kan., in February said it would build its own mad-cow testing
laboratory -- an announcement that prompted a USDA warning that anyone testing
without its approval could face criminal charges. The mad-cow discovery spotlights
whether shoppers should be able to verify the safety of their food however they
want, particularly if the government won't do it for them. The dispute pits consumer
advocates and some beef entrepreneurs against the USDA and big-beef interests.

The only laboratory in the nation testing for mad-cow
disease is the USDA facility in Ames, Iowa. Scientists
there analyze the samples collected for a federal
mad-cow
surveillance program that last year screened one out of every 1,700 cattle slaughtered
in the U.S. Testing for mad-cow disease is getting easy enough for many private
labs to do. Four testing firms make rapid diagnostic kits that can tell, in a
matter of several hours, whether a dead cow was infected. They're widely used
in Japan and in the European Union."
[Very edited from:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/madcow/testing031104.cfm
[See: "USDA
Threatens Beef Company Planning to Test All Cows for Mad Cow Disease:" http://www.organicconsumers.org/madcow/mad-cow-usda.cfm

[Posted
04/28/04]:"State
Looks To Test Beef: Lawmakers Hope To Soften Foreign
Ban: (03/12/04): "Worried that a foreign
embargo on U.S. beef will ruin the state's cattle industry,
state lawmakers may soon introduce legislation to make
California the first state to set broader and faster
testing for mad cow disease. More than 50 countries
have banned U.S. beef since a mad cow case was found
in Washington state, lopping $3.86 billion in annual
export sales from the $40 billion U.S. beef industry,
according to the U.S. Meat Export Federation.

The mere whiff of tougher, decentralized mad cow testing is drawing fire from
the U.S. Department of Agriculture and some in the beef industry. Both caution
that such a move would be a potentially disastrous overreaction to the lone U.S.
case detected in December. The USDA has so far refused the request and cautioned
that testing without its approval - or even selling test kits - is against federal
law.

However, officials in Japan, the country's largest beef export market, are quietly
encouraging wider testing. Japan spent $1.4 billion on U.S. beef last year -
10 percent of foreign beef sales - until it closed its ports to the meat in December
after a Holstein was found with mad cow disease. Japan wants U.S. beef imports
to meet the same standards it has for Japanese beef: tests of all cattle at slaughter
and incineration of all "at-risk materials" - the brain, spinal cord
and intestines that are known to harbor the agent that triggers the disease."
[Very edited from:
http://www.sacbee.com/content/politics/story/8491725p-9420617c.html[Posted
01/27/04]:(12/29/03): "Mad
Cow: USDA Urged To Deploy Rapid Test: Critics
charge the USDA's system, because it tests so few
animals, makes it unlikely more mad cow cases will
be detected.
Concerns about the possible financial impact on the
U.S. beef industry is driving the USDA's reluctance
to implement the rapid test, said Howard Lyman, a
former rancher turned vegetarian. "I would bet
everything I hold sacred if we went out and tested
5 million mature
and downer cattle (in the United States) we would
find (more) animals infected with (mad cow disease)," he
told UPI. Both a former USDA veterinarian and a current
USDA veterinarian echoed Lyman's comments."
[Very edited from an excellent, detailed article at:

[Posted
01/27/04]:(12/26/03): "USDA
Weighs More, Faster Mad Cow Tests: [USDA]
officials declined to say exactly what they would recommend,
but
they acknowledged that European and Japanese regulators
screen millions of animals using tests that take only
three hours -- fast enough to stop diseased carcasses
from being cut up for food. American inspectors have
tested fewer than 30,000 of the roughly 300 million
animals slaughtered in the last nine years, and they
get results
days or weeks later. But the American system was never
intended to keep sick animals from reaching the public's
refrigerators, said Dr. Ron DeHaven, the Agriculture
Department's chief veterinarian. It is "a surveillance
system, not a food-safety test," he said."
[Very edited from:

[Posted
01/27/04]: (12/24/03):
: "Laboratory Backlog Delayed USDA Test For Mad Cow:
A tissue sample from a Washington state dairy cow sat in a federal laboratory
for
a week before it was tested and diagnosed as mad cow disease because of a backlog
of samples, the U.S. Agriculture Department said on Wednesday. The USDA defended
the length of time it took to diagnose the disease. Despite the existence of
mad cow tests that take only a few hours, the USDA uses a diagnostic test that
can take as long as five days to complete."
[Very edited from:

[Posted
01/27/04]: (01/15/04):
UPI EXCLUSIVE: "No Mad Cow Tests In Wash.:
Federal agriculture officials did not test any commercial
cattle for mad cow disease through the first seven
months of 2003 in Washington state -- where the first
U.S. case of the disease was detected last month --
according to records obtained by United Press International.
In addition, no mad cow tests were conducted during
the two-year period at any of the six federally registered
slaughterhouses in Washington state. The testing records,
obtained by UPI under the Freedom of Information Act,
which the USDA delayed releasing for six months, also
show a number of other gaps in the agency's national
surveillance strategy for mad cow disease, including:

-- Tests were conducted at fewer than 100 of the 700 plants known to slaughter
cattle. -- Some of the biggest slaughterhouses were not tested at all. -- Cows
from the top four beef producing states, which account for nearly 70 percent
of all cattle slaughtered each year in the United States, only accounted for
11 percent of all the animals screened. -- Though dairy cattle are considered
the most likely to develop mad cow, some of the top dairy slaughtering plants
were sampled only a few times or not at all. -- The test tally for 2003 includes
more than 1,000 animals ages 24 months or less, which would not test positive
for the disease on the test used by the USDA even if they were infected. Many
of these animals displayed signs that could indicate mad cow disease, including
being downers or unable to stand, and symptoms suggesting a possible brain disorder.

[Posted
12/28/03]: 12/26/03,
by Donald G. Mcneil Jr., NY Times: ""USDA
Weighs More, Faster Mad Cow Tests - Europe, Japan Test
Millions Each Year, Get Results In Hours: As
the American beef industry struggles with its first
case of
mad cow disease,
the Department of Agriculture is debating whether to
do far more screening of meat and change the way meat
from
suspect
animals is used, department officials say. The officials
declined
to say exactly what they would recommend, but they
acknowledged that European and Japanese regulators
screen millions
of animals using tests that take only three hours --
fast
enough to stop
diseased carcasses from being cut up for food. American
inspectors have tested fewer than 30,000 of the roughly
300 million
animals slaughtered in the last nine years, and they
get results days
or weeks later. But the American system was never intended
to keep sick animals from reaching the public's refrigerators,
said Dr. Ron DeHaven, the Agriculture Department's
chief veterinarian. It is "a surveillance system, not a food-safety test," he
said in an interview. Statistically, it is meant only to assure
finding the disease if it exists in one in 1 million animals,
and only after slaughter." [Edited from:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2003/12/26/MNGRB3UMTV1.DTL

[Posted
12/28/03]: 12/25/03: Kyodo News: "35%
of AMR Meat Samples Found To Have Unacceptable Tissues: An
agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture pointed out
in its February report that about 35% of samples from advanced
meat and bone separation machinery had ''unacceptable nervous
tissues'' detected, Kyodo News learned Thursday. In addition,
29% and 10% of the samples had spinal cord tissue and dorsal
nerve root ganglia tissue detected, respectively, the Food
Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) said. The FSIS compiled
the report on the machine, commonly called Advanced Meat
Recovery (AMR) systems, based on a survey it conducted from
the middle of January until the end of August in 2002. It
conducted the survey in response to concerns raised by consumer
group and industry representatives about the risk to human
health from consumption of bovine spinal cord due to a possible
link between mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy
(BSE), and variant Creutzfeld-Jakob (vCJD) disease in humans." [Edited from:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/madcow/35percent2503.cfm
[The FSIS Study:
http://www.fsis.usda.gov/oa/topics/AMRAnalysis.pdf

[Posted
04/29/04]:"Wash
State Cattle Industry Faces Carcass Disposal Quandary: (03/15/04): "A
single case of mad cow disease has cast a shadow of toxic
uncertainty over cattle carcasses, creating ground pollution
concerns and increasing disposal costs. The December discovery
of an infected Washington state Holstein eliminated export
markets for beef and caused a pile-up of cattle byproducts
made by renderers. That has decreased renderers' demand
and left dairy farmers looking for new places -- such as
landfills
and compost piles -- to send carcasses [estimated at 2
billion pounds of cattle annually]. In some cases, they
are choosing
to save money by burying cattle on the farm.

The health consequences are unknown. No one understands
the potential risks of ground water or crop compost contamination
from decomposing cattle -- and possibly
mad cow's brain-destroying proteins. Until government agencies set rules to
protect public health, compost is piling up, and many
landfills are refusing to accept
cattle carcasses. Research indicates that incineration at extremely high temperatures
is necessary to destroy prions, and even that may not work."
[Very edited from:
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/business/national/8191544.htm

[Posted
12/28/03]: 12/27/03:
"Cow
Parts Used In Candles, Soaps Recalled: Cow
parts -- including hooves, bones, fat and innards
-- are used in everything from hand cream and antifreeze,
to poultry feed and gardening soils. In the next
tangled phase of the mad cow investigation, federal
inspectors are concentrating on byproducts from the
tainted Holstein, which might have gone to a half-dozen
distributors in the Northwest, said Dalton Hobbs,
spokesman for the Oregon Department of Agriculture.
Now, it's the secondary parts -- the raw material
for soil, soaps, candles -- that are being recalled.
Los Angeles-based Baker Commodities, Inc., announced
Friday it has voluntarily withheld 800 tons of cow
byproduct processed in its Seattle and Tacoma, Wash.,
plants, said company spokesman Ray Kelly. The company,
like other "renderers," takes
what is left of the cow after it is slaughtered and
boils it down into tallow, used for candles, lubricants
and soaps, and bone meal used in fertilizer and animal
feed." [Edited from:
http://www.local6.com/news/2727658/detail.html

[Posted
12/28/03]: "Animal
Rendering Products In More Places Than You Think: You'll
Be Surprised To Learn What Goes Into Film, Glue & Crayons:" (by
Renea Mohammed, The Vancouver Humane Society Newsletter
Summer 2003): "Human food is not the only "product" derived
from the bodies of factory farmed and other animals.
Animals or their parts not considered suitable
for the dinner table are typically sent to rendering
plants.
Rendering plants take in a wide variety of source
materials that include parts such as brains, eyeballs,
spinal cords,
intestines, bones, feathers or hooves as well as
restaurant grease, supermarket rejects such as
spoiled steak, road
kill and in some areas euthanized cats and dogs
from veterinarians and animal shelters. Such source
materials
are processed at the rendering plant into ingredients
used in a number of products that many people do
not associate with animals. Such products include
soap, toothpaste,
mouthwash, hair dyes, nail polish, photographic
film, crayons, glue, solvents, shoe polish, toys,
anti-freeze,
ornaments, pharmaceutical products and cosmetics
(including those not tested on animals). There
have been some health
concerns associated with the rendering industry.
Perhaps the best known of these is Bovine Spongiform
Encephalopathy
or mad cow disease."

"A
Look Inside a Rendering Plant" (by GS): "Rendering
has been called "the silent industry." Each
year in the US, 286 rendering plants quietly dispose
of more than 12.5 million tons of dead animals, fat
and meat wastes. As the public relations watchdog
newsletter PR Watch observes, renderers "are
thankful that most people remain blissfully unaware
of their existence."

"Food
not Fit for a Pet" (by Dr. Wendell O. Belfield): "Some
of these dead pets -- those euthanized by veterinarians
-- already contain pentobarbital before treatment
with the denaturing process. According to University
of Minnesota researchers, the sodium pentobarbital
used to euthanize pets "survives rendering without
undergoing degradation." [Short, but powerful
article by an expert]

"Mad
cow outbreak may have been caused by animal rendering
plants" (NY Times News Service): "Renderers
in the United States pick up 100 million pounds of
waste material every day -- a witch's brew of feet,
heads, stomachs, intestines, hooves, spinal cords,
tails, grease, feathers and bones. Half of every
butchered cow and a third of every pig is not consumed
by humans. An estimated six million to seven million
dogs and cats are killed in animal shelters each
year, said Jeff Frace, a spokesman for the American
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
in New York City."

"The
Rendering Industry: Big Business in By-Products" (by
Kieran Mulvaney): "Processed cow fats are sometimes
used to make cookies and salty snacks taste rich
and to make lipsticks glide smoothly. Cow proteins
show up in shampoo. Collagen, extracted from the
inner layer of cattle hide, is used to balm wounds
and cosmetically puff up lips. Gelatin, refined from
cattle hide and bones, is found in such foods as
ice cream, gummy candies and marshmallows--as well
as the capsules encasing drugs."

"How
Dead Pets, Bad Brains, and Free Speech Landed Me
in Amarillo" (by Van Smith): "We were
at once aghast, amused, and skeptical. "No,
really, it's true," they said blandly, sensing
our doubts. "We pick up dead pets from the SPCA
and take them to the plant. The plant cooks up the
carcasses and other things to make stuff that goes
into pet food. Honest."

"Beauty,
Pride and Pig Grease" (by Sandi Mitchell): "The
great majority of the product is sold for women's
makeup, especially to manufacturers of lipstick and
eye makeup. Some of the most prestigious cosmetic
companies in the country are the chief customers
of rendering plants."

"The
NRA [National Renders
Association] is an American Trade Association,
whose business is to promote the interests of it's
members. Members of this association are all in the
business of rendering, i.e. transforming waste from
the meat industry into useable products for animal
feeds and technical use."